Some of our most treasured Christmas carols are at risk of disappearing, as more than eight in 10 Brits admit to not knowing the words to most British classics.

A seasonal survey has revealed that 85% of us don’t know the full lyrics to festive favourites such as Away in a Manger, Silent Night, The Holly and the Ivy, Good King Wenceslas or Hark the Herald Angels Sing.

Just five per cent of people polled stated that they were confident they could sing every word of a Christmas carol with an honest one in 10 stating they would mime or hum along to words they were unsure of.

It’s believed a declining number of churchgoers combined with the increasing availability of modern music were two of the main reasons behind the lack of recall.

Christmas is coming, and with it the endless stream of carol singers knocking on your door before launching into out-of-tune renditions of barely-remembered traditional songs. In fact, research from the Daily Mail reveals we’re all completely unaware of how a carol song should actually sound – with most of us having only a passing familiarity with the lyrics.

It’s important and revelatory research, I’m sure you’ll agree, so I hope you’ll join me in giving three cheers to the company behind the research – fellow visitors to the doorstep of life:

According the survey by free delivery website FreeDeliveryLand.co.uk common mistakes include: ‘The cattle are mooing’ rather than ‘lowing’, ‘Bearing gifts we travel so far’ rather than ‘traverse afar’ and, ‘Good king Wencles last looked out’ instead of ‘Wenceslas looked out.’

Not every story has to have a big reveal – sometimes, it’s enough for a takeaway company to use Christmas carols to get a little headline attention.